The United Kingdom

[unmerged(157031)]

The UK's AI is all wrong; in older versions of HoI2, the UK couldn't defend the homeland if she was given all of the troops in the world, but now she can't defend her colonies at all.

Case and point: All of her colonial troops are in the homeland. Vast swathes of Africa are undefended as thousands of Indian and African troops are stationed along the British coastline. It wouldn't be so bad if it was just the British MOT divisions and tanks, but the swarms of militia and weak level 1 inf make securing a beachead litterally impossible, even with a paratrooper invasion.

This needs to be rectified. Italy is currently storming through northern Africa with only Egyptian troops to fight against, while Japan could launch an attack on the Eastern British colonies unopposed.

This could all be fixed simply by re-intergrating Egypt with the rest of the UK, instead of having it a puppet of the UK. Having it a puppet is utterly pointless, and means that the AI does not prioratise defending Africa like it should do; after all, the AI should assume that the homeland is nicly defended behind the channel and the RAF and shouldn't decide to pull all her colonial troops out of the colonies in 1933.

TL;DR Britain is acting even stupider than before.

 

[unmerged(176442)]

I second that.
I played to games as Germany and the US till 41 and its the same. Italy is smashing one or two commonwealth divisions in Egypt with several Army Groups and then proceeds to "conquer" all of Africa without resistance. In the meantime the British and Canadians have more than 50 division at Home doing nothing, no matter how far Italy advances in Africa and the Middle East.
No Africa Corps needed. In fact, during my last game Rommel shook hands with the Italians in the Caucasus after the Wehrmacht drove through Russia nearly unopposed.

I gave up on the Japan thing. It seems to be impossible for any game or mod to make National China strong enough not to get smashed by Japan until 39.
No wonder the Commonwealth cant hold India against battle hardened Japs. Don’t think they could have in RL if the Imperial Army had been able to conquer all of China.

 

[tigeriii]

Okay I will third this! haha

Well if I could get past 1940 in any one of my 4 games without having to screenshot a bug or an issue or make a comment on the forum then I could comment here, but I will say that Egypt being a puppet is a nice idea but a really bad situation for the UK. Granted it gives UK more choices to move troops elsewhere, it also gives Italy uncontested reign in the Mediterranean and thats not good.

I say throw an event in there to have UK take back Egypt and force them to garrison it to prevent Suez being captured. Well thats my take on that seeing how I saw Italy build up like 25 divisions on border of Egypt and never declared war with them. I think Mussolini thought the Egyptians might be tougher then Ethiopians so they had a stand order! hehe

Japan rolls China like a baker rolls dough for donuts. LOL. I have screenshots of Japan rolling RUSSIA in the EAST too. Now that is some bad muthas there! Oh well over time I feel the fixes will eventually cure this but till then lets just keep plugging our issues to the devs.

They have been rather quick with little fixes but also new ones prop up too with them, but thats the never ending cycle of process control.

 

[Kelben]

As Italy with revision 1, Egypt stood neutral in the war and independent toward the UK.

 

[quintelosky]

TL;DR Britain is acting even stupider than before.

I totally disagree with this post

Is simple, the AI-uk is programmed to protect the homeland the first years of war.

The island is the most important. In the original game all players say '...uk never protect the island...bad', now tha AI protect the island and say '...uk never protect the colonies...bad', or '...italy don't do nothing in africa...bad' and now 'italy conquer africa....bad'

Sorry, but I'm confused. Now, the AI focus their operations in the most important objectives. The colonies can be recover, the homeland no (normally).

The AI can't protect all, and in 40 and 41 the important is the island. You don't worry, in 41-42 you can view that uk recover africa. And in Burma, the AI, protect good their fronts.

Sorry for this post, but 'fix that' 'fix here' 'fix this'.... If the AI don't conquer, 'fix that'. If the AI conquer, 'fix that' :wacko:

 

[Kelben]

Yes and besides quintelosky, in this case, I tend to approve your point of view. I mean, people wants an historical stalemate in El Alamo, same in Japan/China war (not so bad in AoD by the way). But then there is not much interest in playing the game if always, Japan does not conquer China and Italy does not go further than El Alamo. I mean, replaying the History, 20 times is quite boring...
Notwithstanding, there might be some balance so that okay, UK protects the homeland but does not over do it. When you have 6 infantries on a beach and a few mobile forces behind, I don't think an amphibious assault is easy (at least on AoD).

 

[unmerged(176442)]

And want i both ways

IMHO the game should be realistic meaning that AI should act like it did in RL.
It should be possible to play with any nation till 41 without any ahistoric happening as long as you are not responsible for it. Not always but most of the time.

So, the United Kingdom giving priority to Great Britain is only the right thing to do to some extend. Protecting Britain doesnt mean you did in with all available divisions while your leave your colonies wide open for attack. It didnt happen in RL and it shouldnt happen ingame.
The Allies did fight for North Africa. They committed fast amounts of ressources to the campaign. Iron Cross fails to address that.
Instead a handfull of Italian Infantry Division March into Palestine and through all of Africa where the first organized resistance will be the mighty South African National Guard.
IMHO this is far from ideal.
Where are the Canadians, New Zealanders, Australians? They all fought there but in Iron Cross they have two dozens deployable divisions sitting at home guarding coastlines.
This is not "OMG you want it do be historic every time, sooo boring!!2!". I just want to have the chance of playing historical until 41. I dont see having it at all.


If you care for some adivse, i think you should look at balancing again.

The Axis is way to powerful in your game. Human player or not, Germany steamrolls everyone with ease while the Allies cant do much with their low IC. I havent played Italy yet but from what i saw i think they are overpowered as well. Japan overruns China but thats nothing new. A bigger issue is the Soviet Union being way to weak. The Germans overrun the Red Army finished Barbarossa way east of Moscow / Stalingrad with their main issue being supplies. The Red Army doesnt exist anymore by then.

The obvious solution for this problem is to weaken Germany.
With 500++ IC in 39 all you need to worry about is manpower.

I totally disagree with this post

Is simple, the AI-uk is programmed to protect the homeland the first years of war.

The island is the most important. In the original game all players say '...uk never protect the island...bad', now tha AI protect the island and say '...uk never protect the colonies...bad', or '...italy don't do nothing in africa...bad' and now 'italy conquer africa....bad'

Sorry, but I'm confused. Now, the AI focus their operations in the most important objectives. The colonies can be recover, the homeland no (normally).

The AI can't protect all, and in 40 and 41 the important is the island. You don't worry, in 41-42 you can view that uk recover africa. And in Burma, the AI, protect good their fronts.

Sorry for this post, but 'fix that' 'fix here' 'fix this'.... If the AI don't conquer, 'fix that'. If the AI conquer, 'fix that' :wacko:

 

[datachild]

I have to play past 1940 yet, but in other mods with similar conditions Italy managed to take over most of Egypt up to the South of Egypt and sieged Suez. But later UK smashed them utterly and the entry of US to the war finished them of in a two front war. It's not exactly historic, but always exciting to watch.

 

[Kelben]

Early 41 in my game as Italy, it is true that the UK suddenly assault Corsica/Sardinia and the Middle East with motorized division and infantry.

 

[lordgoof]

As italy i always take egypt and the suez no problem but if i don't hurry and take africa i get stuck with a 30 or 40 division invasion force which takes all my troops to contain. They might not be there johnny on the spot but it doesn't take them too long to get their act together.

 

[unmerged(157031)]

I totally disagree with this post

Is simple, the AI-uk is programmed to protect the homeland the first years of war.

The island is the most important. In the original game all players say '...uk never protect the island...bad', now tha AI protect the island and say '...uk never protect the colonies...bad', or '...italy don't do nothing in africa...bad' and now 'italy conquer africa....bad'

Sorry, but I'm confused. Now, the AI focus their operations in the most important objectives. The colonies can be recover, the homeland no (normally).

The AI can't protect all, and in 40 and 41 the important is the island. You don't worry, in 41-42 you can view that uk recover africa. And in Burma, the AI, protect good their fronts.

Sorry for this post, but 'fix that' 'fix here' 'fix this'.... If the AI don't conquer, 'fix that'. If the AI conquer, 'fix that' :wacko:

I'm not aying that trying to make the UK tougher is neccicarily a bad thing; there is however a fine line between 'fixing' and 'over doing it'. Besides, historically Britain would never be able to field enough troops to defend the home land, especially with the majority of her artillary and equipment being left on the beaches of Dunkurque. The UK's AI never has and likely never will land troops in France, and now won't even move her troops to defend the colonies! In trying to fix one problem you've created two new ones! The UK should assume that the navy and RAF are sufficiant protextion, and that the colonies needs the majority of her land forces.

 

[guderien]

I totally disagree with this post

Is simple, the AI-uk is programmed to protect the homeland the first years of war.

The island is the most important. In the original game all players say '...uk never protect the island...bad', now tha AI protect the island and say '...uk never protect the colonies...bad', or '...italy don't do nothing in africa...bad' and now 'italy conquer africa....bad'

Sorry, but I'm confused. Now, the AI focus their operations in the most important objectives. The colonies can be recover, the homeland no (normally).

The AI can't protect all, and in 40 and 41 the important is the island. You don't worry, in 41-42 you can view that uk recover africa. And in Burma, the AI, protect good their fronts.

Sorry for this post, but 'fix that' 'fix here' 'fix this'.... If the AI don't conquer, 'fix that'. If the AI conquer, 'fix that' :wacko:

I thank you for your explanations, because I didn't understood anything in AI strategy with UK in IC. Now, did you ever heard about the way british forces fought in WW2? It was not by waiting for the enemy on England's beachs, but by figthing Axis' forces every place and every time it was possible, they won the war. With your strategy, Gibraltar, Malta, Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Koweit, Sudan, Kenya at least may be in Axis' hands at december 1940. And facing a middle competent german player (eventually assuming control of italian units), United Kingdom will never recover all these territories. I imagine it must be difficult for the programming team to simulate british grand strategy in WW2, but after all it's their job - or at least their hobby.